The field of the invention generally pertains to receptacles. The invention relates more particularly to trays for holding tools, parts, and the like while working on machinery.
During the repair and/or maintenance of machinery, such as an automobile engine, it is common to remove many small parts such as nuts, bolts, and washers. Many times there is no convenient spot to place the small parts for later reinstallation. And often the small parts fall into the engine compartment or are otherwise misplaced, resulting in frustration and delay.
Various magnetically held trays have been used in an effort to alleviate this problem and facilitate repair and/or maintenance operations. For example, in U.S. Pat. No. 5,405,004, a tray is shown having a magnet positioned in the center of the floor of the tray. Although this tray may be useful on horizontal ferromagnetic surfaces, often there are repair and/or maintenance operations where a horizontal ferromagnetic surface is not available.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,078,281 a magnetically held tray is shown pivotally affixed to a U-shaped bracket having a magnet. The tray angle is adjustable on the bracket by means of thumb screws. Although this tray does not require a horizontal surface, it requires a relatively large flat ferromagnetic surface for appropriate use. Moreover, this tray requires separate screw-type adjustments to release and hold the tray at various angles. This tends to be cumbersome and inconvenient, especially when the nature of the repair or maintenance operation requires the mechanic to move to multiple locations having different surface angles.
Another example of a tool tray utilizing screw-type adjustments for pivoting the tray angle is shown in U.S. Pat. No. 5,331,904. The tool tray is supported by tray support ends adjustable to various engine compartment sizes, and includes knobs at each end to adjust and hold the tray on a level plane. The utility of this tool tray is limited, however, because it cannot be used anywhere other than in the automobile engine compartment. Moreover, this tool tray also requires separate screw-type adjustments to hold the tray at various angles.
In U.S. Pat. No. 5,699,910, a somewhat more flexible mechanic's tray is shown having a pair of independently movable magnet assemblies held to the tray by bolt and wing-nut fastener combinations. However, similar to the tool trays in U.S. Pat. No. 5,331,904 and U.S. Pat. No. 5,078,281, this tray also requires separate and independent screw-type adjustments to hold the tray at a desired angle. This method requires one hand to hold the tray while the other hand adjusts the fastener, and then repeating the procedure for the other end. Further, since the allowable load on the tray will directly depend on how tight the screw-type fastener is secured, this raises the uncertainty and risk of the tray dropping and losing its contents.